Iran nuclear program set back 2 years after US strikes: Pentagon
"We have degraded their program by one to two years, at least intel assessments inside the Department [of Defense] assess that," Defense Department spokesman Sean Parnell told reporters.
"We believe that Iran's nuclear capability has been severely degraded, perhaps even their ambition to build a bomb," he added, though security experts have told Fox News Digital that Tehran is unlikely to be deterred in its ambition to build a nuclear weapon.
The announcement reflects a far more positive assessment regarding the success of the June 22 strikes that targeted the Fordo, Isfahan and Natanz nuclear sites than previous estimates regarding the extent to which Tehran's atomic capabilities had been degraded.
Rafael Grossi, head of the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), over the weekend warned that Iran may be able to resume enriching uranium within a matter of months.
The comments also coincided with reports that Iran may have been able to move some of its stockpiles of near-weapons-grade enriched uranium, or possibly centrifuges, after satellite images showed more than a dozen cargo trucks were spotted at the Fordow nuclear site prior to the U.S. strikes.
The U.S. has fervently denied that any intelligence suggests Iran was successful in moving its nuclear capabilities off site. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth became angry when asked about the possibility by reporters.
Fox News Digital has confirmed that Israel is continuing to monitor the security situation.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi this week acknowledged that there was severe damage to the Fordow facility, though he also insisted that "the technology and knowhow is still there."
"No one exactly knows what has transpired in Fordow. That being said, what we know so far is that the facilities have been seriously and heavily damaged," Aragchi said during a CBS interview this week.
Though according to Parnell on Wednesday, "All of the intelligence that we've seen (has) led us to believe that Iran's – those facilities especially, have been completely obliterated."
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Washington Post
an hour ago
- Washington Post
American bombs in Iran also reverberate in China and North Korea
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — President Donald Trump campaigned on keeping the United States out of foreign wars, but it didn't take long to convince him to come to the direct aid of Israel, hitting Iranian nuclear targets with bunker-buster bombs dropped by B-2 stealth bombers and Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from a submarine.
Associated Press
an hour ago
- Associated Press
American bombs in Iran also reverberate in China and North Korea
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — President Donald Trump campaigned on keeping the United States out of foreign wars, but it didn't take long to convince him to come to the direct aid of Israel, hitting Iranian nuclear targets with bunker-buster bombs dropped by B-2 stealth bombers and Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from a submarine. Beyond the attack's immediate impact on helping bring the 12-day war to a close, experts say Trump's decision to use force against another country also will certainly be reverberating in the Asia-Pacific, Washington's priority theater. 'Trump's strikes on Iran show that he's not afraid to use military force — this would send a clear message to North Korea, and even to China and Russia, about Trump's style,' said Duyeon Kim, a senior analyst at the Center for a New American Security based in Seoul, South Korea. 'Before the strikes, Pyongyang and Beijing might have assumed that Trump is risk averse, particularly based on his behavior his first presidency despite some tough talk,' Kim said. China, North Korea and Russia all condemn US strike Ten days into the war between Israel and Iran, Trump made the risky decision to step in, hitting three nuclear sites with American firepower on June 22 in a bid to destroy the country's nuclear program at a time while negotiations between Washington and Tehran were still ongoing. The attacks prompted a pro forma Iranian retaliatory strike the following day on a U.S. base in nearby Qatar, which caused no casualties, and both Iran and Israel then agreed to a ceasefire on June 24. North Korea, China and Russia all were quick to condemn the American attack, with Russian President Vladimir Putin calling it 'unprovoked aggression,' China's Foreign Ministry saying it violated international law and 'exacerbated tensions in the Middle East,' and North Korea's Foreign Ministry maintaining it 'trampled down the territorial integrity and security interests of a sovereign state.' While the strikes were a clear tactical success, the jury is still out on whether they will have a more broad strategic benefit to Washington's goals in the Middle East or convince Iran it needs to work harder than ever to develop a nuclear deterrent, possibly pulling the U.S. back into a longer-term conflict. US allies could see attack as positive sign for deterrence If the attack remains a one-off strike, U.S. allies in the Asia-Pacific region likely will see the decision to become involved as a positive sign from Trump's administration, said Euan Graham, a senior defense analyst with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. 'The U.S. strike on Iran will be regarded as net plus by Pacific allies if it is seen to reinforce red lines, restore deterrence and is of limited duration, so as not to pull the administration off-course from its stated priorities in the Indo-Pacific,' he said. 'China will take note that Trump is prepared to use force, at least opportunistically.' In China, many who have seen Trump as having a 'no-war mentality' will reassess that in the wake of the attacks, which were partially aimed at forcing Iran's hand in nuclear program negotiations, said Zhao Minghao, an international relations professor at China's Fudan University in Shanghai. 'The way the U.S. used power with its air attacks against Iran is something China needs to pay attention to,' he said. 'How Trump used power to force negotiations has a significance for how China and the U.S. will interact in the future.' But, he said, Washington should not think it can employ the same strategy with Beijing. 'If a conflict breaks out between China and the U.S., it may be difficult for the U.S. to withdraw as soon as possible, let alone withdraw unscathed,' he said. China and North Korea present different challenges Indeed, China and North Korea present very different challenges than Iran. First and foremost, both already have nuclear weapons, raising the stakes of possible retaliation considerably in the event of any attack. There also is no Asian equivalent of Israel, whose relentless attacks on Iranian missile defenses in the opening days of the war paved the way for the B-2 bombers to fly in and out without a shot being fired at them. Still, the possibility of the U.S. becoming involved in a conflict involving either China or North Korea is a very real one, and Beijing and Pyongyang will almost certainly try to assess what the notoriously unpredictable Trump would do. North Korea will likely be 'quite alarmed' at what Israel, with a relatively small but high-quality force, has been able to achieve over Iran, said Joseph Dempsey, a defense expert with the International Institute for Strategic Studies. At the same time, it likely will be seen internally as justification for its own nuclear weapons program, 'If Iran did have deployable nuclear weapons would this have occurred?' Dempsey said. 'Probably not.' The U.S. decision to attack while still in talks with Iran will also not go unnoticed, said Hong Min, a senior analyst at South Korea's Institute for National Unification. 'North Korea may conclude that dialogue, if done carelessly, could backfire by giving the United States a pretext for possible aggression,' he said. 'Instead of provoking the Trump administration, North Korea is more likely to take an even more passive stance toward negotiations with Washington, instead focusing on strengthening its internal military buildup and pursuing closer ties with Russia, narrowing the prospects for future talks,' he said. China and Taiwan will draw lessons China will look at the attacks through the visor of Taiwan, the self-governing democratic island off its coast that China claims as its own territory and President Xi Jinping has not ruled out taking by force. The U.S. supplies Taiwan with weapons and is one of its most important allies, though Washington's official policy on whether it would come to Taiwan's aid in the case of a conflict with China is known as 'strategic ambiguity,' meaning not committing to how it would respond. Militarily, the strike on Iran raises the question of whether the U.S. might show less restraint than has been expected by China in its response and hit targets on the Chinese mainland in the event of an invasion of Taiwan, said Drew Thompson, senior fellow with the Singapore-based think tank RSIS Rajaratnam School of International Studies. It will also certainly underscore for Beijing the 'difficulty of predicting Trump's actions,' he said. 'The U.S. airstrike on Iran's nuclear facilities caught many by surprise,' Thompson said. 'I think it demonstrated a tolerance and acceptance of risk in the Trump administration that is perhaps surprising.' It also gives rise to a concern that Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te, who in recent speeches has increased warnings about the threat from China, may be further emboldened in his rhetoric, said Lyle Goldstein, director of the Asia Program at the Washington-based foreign policy think tank Defense Priorities. Already, Lai's words have prompted China to accuse him of pursuing Taiwanese independence, which is a red line for Beijing. Goldstein said he worried Taiwan may try to take advantage of the American 'use of force against Iran to increase its deterrent situation versus the mainland.' 'President Lai's series of recent speeches appear almost designed to set up a new cross-strait crisis, perhaps in the hopes of building more support in Washington and elsewhere around the Pacific,' said Goldstein, who also is director of the China Initiative at Brown University's Watson Institute. 'I think that is an exceedingly risky gambit, to put it mildly,' he said. ___ Tong-hyung Kim in Seoul, South Korea, and Didi Tang and Albee Zhang in Washington contributed to this report.
Atlantic
2 hours ago
- Atlantic
The Great Realignment
The American president wrote, 'Vladimir, STOP!' on his Truth Social account in April, but the Russian president did not halt his offensive in eastern Ukraine. The Ukrainian president called for an unconditional cease-fire in May, but the Russians did not agree to stop attacking Ukrainian civilians from the air. Donald Trump repeatedly promised, during his campaign, that he would end the war 'in one day,' but the war is not over. Instead, the Russian invasion of Ukraine does not merely continue. It accelerates. Most evenings, Russian troops hit Ukrainian apartment buildings, factories, infrastructure, and people, using ever more drones and missiles. On the ground, Ukraine's top commander has said that the Russians are preparing a new summer offensive, with 695,000 troops spread across the front line. Russian soldiers also continue to be wounded or killed at extraordinary rates, with between 35,000 and 45,000 casualties every month, while billions of dollars' worth of Russian equipment are destroyed every week by Ukrainian drones. The Russian economy suffers from high inflation and is heading for a recession. But Vladimir Putin is not looking for a cease-fire, and he does not want to negotiate. Why? Because he believes that he can win. Thanks to the actions of the U.S. government, he still thinks that he can conquer all of Ukraine. Putin sees what everyone else sees: Slowly, the U.S. is switching sides. True, Trump occasionally berates Putin, or makes sympathetic noises toward Ukrainians, as he did last week when he seemed to express interest in a Ukrainian journalist who said that her husband was in the military. Trump also appeared to enjoy being flattered at the NATO summit, where European leaders made a decision, hailed as historic, to further raise defense spending. But thanks to quieter decisions by members of his own administration, people whom he has appointed, the American realignment with Russia and against Ukraine and Europe is gathering pace—not merely in rhetoric but in reality. Just this week, in the middle of the worst aerial-bombing campaign since the war began, the Trump administration confirmed that a large shipment of weapons, which had already been funded by the Biden administration, will not be sent to Ukraine. The weapons, some of which are already in Poland, include artillery shells, missiles, rockets, and, most important, interceptors for Patriot air-defense systems, the ammunition that Ukrainians need to protect civilians from missile attacks. Trump had suggested that he would supply Ukraine with more Patriot ammunition, which is an American product. 'We're going to see if we can make some available,' he said after meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last week. But what he says and what his administration actually does are very different. Pentagon spokespeople have explained that this abrupt change was made because American stockpiles are insufficient, an excuse disputed both by former Biden-administration officials and by independent policy analysts. But whether true or false, this reasoning doesn't matter to the Russians, who have already interpreted this change as a clear signal that American support for Ukraine is ending: 'The fewer the number of weapons that are delivered to Ukraine, the closer the end of the special military operation,' the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. To be clear, by 'the end of the special military operation,' he means the defeat of Ukraine. At the same time, and with much less publicity, the U.S. is essentially lifting sanctions on Russia. No such formal announcement has been made. But the maintenance of sanctions requires constant shifts and adjustments, as Russian companies and other entities change suppliers and tactics in order to acquire sanctioned products. During the Biden administration, I spoke several times with officials who followed these changes closely, and who repeatedly issued new sanctions in order to counter them. As The New York Times has reported, the Trump administration has stopped following these shifts and stopped imposing new sanctions altogether. This, the Times writes, allows 'new dummy companies to funnel funds and critical components to Russia, including computer chips and military equipment.' In addition to taking Russia's side in the kinetic war and the economic war, the U.S. is realigning its position in the narrative war, too. During the Biden administration, the State Department's Global Engagement Center regularly identified Russian disinformation operations around the world—exposing misleading websites or campaigns secretly run or directed by Russian operatives in Latin America and Africa, as well as in Europe. Trump appointees have not only dissolved the center; they also baselessly and bizarrely accused it of somehow harming American conservatives, even of having ' actively silenced and censored the voices of Americans,' although the GEC had no operations inside the U.S. At the same time, cuts to USAID and other programs have abruptly reduced funding for some independent media and Russian-opposition media. The planned cuts to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, if not stopped by the courts, will destroy one of the few outside sources of information that reaches Russians with real news about the war. Should all of these changes become permanent, the U.S. will no longer have any tools available to communicate with the Russian public or counter Russian propaganda, either inside Russia or around the world. Listen: Trump's betrayal of Ukraine Inside the United States, Russian propaganda is most loudly and effectively promoted by appointees of the U.S. president. Steve Witkoff, the real-estate developer who became Trump's main negotiator with Russia despite having no knowledge of Russian history or politics, regularly echoes false Russian talking points and propaganda. He has repeated Putin's view, which he may have heard from the Russian president himself, that 'Ukraine is just a false country, that they just patched together in this sort of mosaic, these regions.' Witkoff has also seemed to agree with Putin that Ukrainian territories that voted for independence from Moscow in 1991 are somehow 'Russian.' By accepting disputed claims as fact, Witkoff is also helping Putin continue his war. In order to keep Russians onboard, to create divisions among Ukraine's allies, and maybe even to build doubts inside Ukraine itself, Putin needs to portray the Ukrainian cause as hopeless and to describe the Ukrainian 'demands' as unreasonable. He has to hide the most basic facts about this war: that he began it, that he has killed hundreds of thousands of people in pursuit of it, and that his goal, again, is to destroy or decapitate all of Ukraine. Witkoff helps make these falsehoods easier to sustain, in Russia, in the U.S., and in Europe. Add all of these things together, and they are something more than just a pattern. They are a set of incentives that help persuade Putin to keep fighting. Sanctions are disappearing, weapons are diminishing, counterpropaganda is harder to hear. All of that will encourage Putin to go further—not just to try to defeat Ukraine but to divide Europe, mortally damage NATO, and reduce the power and influence of the United States around the world. Europe, Canada, and most of the rest of the democratic world will continue to back Ukraine. As I have written before, Ukrainians will continue to innovate, to build new kinds of automated weapons, new drones, new software. They will continue to fight, because the alternative is the end of their civilization, their language, and, for many of them, their lives. The Ukrainians could still win. A different set of American policies could help them win faster. The U.S. could still expand sanctions on Russia, provide ammunition, and help the Ukrainians win the narrative war. The administration could stop the fighting, the missile attacks, and the lethal drone swarms; it could stop the pointless deaths that Trump has repeatedly said he opposes. By choosing to back Russia, the U.S. will ensure that the war continues. Only by backing Ukraine is there hope for peace.
